


Fast And Thorough And Sharp As A Tack

by Nevcolleil



Category: Chuck (TV), Glee
Genre: Cooper is Bryce, Crossover, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-06
Updated: 2013-07-06
Packaged: 2017-12-17 20:00:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/871423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nevcolleil/pseuds/Nevcolleil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Despite the whirlwind madness of the last two and a half years, Blaine thinks that his life has more or less settled into something great. And then the Russians crash his prom.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fast And Thorough And Sharp As A Tack

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for Blam Week Day Five: Crossovers. You don't have to have watched Chuck to enjoy it (I hope!)

So despite the whirlwind madness of the last two and a half years, Blaine thinks that his life has more or less settled into everything that he'd like for it to be.

His senior year is almost over, and he'll have his choice of colleges to attend in the fall. He now has both a cheerleading and a show choir national championship to add to his resume, giving the summation of his high school accomplishments a nice, well-rounded feel. 

Blaine's still not entirely over the loss of his relationship with Kurt, but the friendships he's strengthened this year have more than filled the void that almost consumed him when he realized that he can't be what Kurt needs for him to be. What's more, they've helped Blaine realize that he is _better_ for having other people in his life, people who are close to him - that he's _stronger_ for having someone to support him and to remind him who he is when he's forgotten. It's a bitter people to swallow that Blaine's "someone" can't be the boy he fell in love with so completely back at Dalton, but he's made his peace with the fact that allowing Kurt to continue being a part of Blaine's reality meant posing a threat to the future of Kurt's dreams. Broadway... making a name for himself- Blaine can't tell Kurt that these are things that he can't have for himself anymore; doesn't even miss wanting that much, when he considers the alternatives, and Blaine certainly won't ask Kurt to give up the hope for those things as well. Kurt was born to shine for the world... Blaine still believes that. There was nothing else to do but to let Kurt go when Blaine realized that he was born to contribute to the world in a much less... obvious way. 

"A _spy_? Dude... You need to have your head examined. We're just a couple of teenaged kids!"

Which brings Blaine back to his previous thoughts- 

His life has settled, more or less, into something great. He doesn't have Kurt, but he has his friends - he has Sam, and in Sam Blaine even has someone to love again, no matter that his love can't be reciprocated in the way that he'd really like for it to be. Here they sit, in their tuxedos, at their senior prom - Blaine's senior prom, which Sam agreed to attend as Blaine's _date_ after Brittany broke up with him... this is the "more" that Blaine has been thinking about.

The "less" is the fact that the collar and the cuffs of Blaine's tuxedo shirt are spotted with blood. The slow, warm trickle down the side of Blaine's face from the small gash in his head is probably why Blaine can sit here like this, just meandering through his thoughts, in the middle of this crisis. And meanwhile, a mean-smiling Russian with an axe to grind is circling Blaine and Sam where they sit, back to back, in the center of the choir room, his goons flanking every exit. 

The Russian keeps _talking_... which Blaine will admit, is probably good - considering he has Sam here, he's unarmed, he's woozy from head trauma and blood loss, and he knows what Kostanovitch will do when he's _done_ talking... But Blaine hears the shock and incredulity in Sam's voice, and suddenly he's a lot less worried about bleeding out or collateral damage or getting his cover blown. 

He just doesn't want Sam to hate him when he finds out that Blaine's been lying to him all this time.

"Tell him, Blaine," Sam says, obviously freaked out but trying to remain calm, to be brave, and Blaine just closes his eyes. _He_ may be stronger for having someone in his life... for having Sam... but Sam is certainly no safer for having Blaine in his. It hurt to cut Kurt out, but Blaine managed it; why couldn't he do the same for Sam as soon as he realized that his "crush" had become something more? Sam deserved Blaine's protection every bit as much as Kurt. 

And now there are semi-automatic weapons and terrorists standing in the same building as the man that Blaine loves. 

"Sam..."

"Yes, tell me, Mr. Anderson," Kostanovitch sneers, strolling around to face Blaine yet again. "Tell me you are just an innocent _boy_ and that all this is just a terrible misunderstanding."

Blaine hears several of Kostanovitch's men snicker in the background.

He looks up and he glares, turning every bit of fear and guilt he feels into anger - fury, that anyone would just come onto his campus like this, threaten someone that he cares about, threaten _Sam_ \- and projecting it outward pretty convincingly, Blaine supposes, judging by the way the snickering stops on the side of the room that can see Blaine's face, the goons in his line of sight exchanging glances with one another and fidgeting where they stand.

Yeah, Blaine is a spy. Not an incredibly active one... But he does as much as he can do without neglecting his homework and extracurricular activities. And the Intersect has a reputation that isn't solely connected to him, not that Kostanovitch knows that.

"I'll tell you one thing, Kostanovitch," Blaine says, in the same voice he might use to answer a discussion topic in a classroom. Shortly after he began spying, Blaine realized that posturing would rarely get him taken seriously. Especially now that word of the Intersect and what "it" can do has spread throughout the spy world, Blaine doesn't have to be a badass to intimidate his enemies. Ironically, the scariest thing Blaine can apparently be is himself. Polite, charming, soft-spoken... He smiles often and never cusses. It takes all he's got to act natural while not letting any of his natural fear show, but the payoff is that Blaine's made some truly deadly, grown men almost pee themselves simply by showing good manners as he asked them to ' _calmly step away from the detonator so I don't have to shoot you in the head, okay? Thanks!_ ' "If you hurt him, you'd better kill me first."

"Blaine!"

Blaine can't respond to Sam's panicked response. He can't give in to the urge to try and bargain for Sam's life. He knows Kostanovitch isn't going to just let Sam walk out of here before the Russian's through doing whatever's he's come here to do. The most Blaine can hope for is to keep Kostanovitch's focus on him and that Sam's obvious ignorance of Blaine's other life will save him from a lot of suffering even if it might not save his life.

Kostanovitch pulls his sidearm and Blaine has to grit his teeth not to let his body react to the flash that automatically goes off in his head. Kostanovitch's goons all have their guns out and pointed at him already (the Intersect's reputation isn't _always_ helpful), and Blaine is fast, but he can't dodge bullets. 

Kostanovitch reaches right over Blaine's shoulder and presses the barrel of his gun to the back of Sam's head.

"Holy shit!" Sam squeaks, but doesn't move, and flash or no flash, Blaine's entire body turns to ice.

"I'm going to hurt him very much unless you do exactly what I tell you to do," Kostanovitch coos, smile broadening cruelly. "And then, don't worry, I _will_ kill you." 

"Leave him alone!" Sam yells, squirming against the rope tied around his wrists and ankles.

Blaine's already made his decision, so he's only reminded of why when Sam acts so selfless and courageous like this.

"I'll do anything you ask," Blaine promises.

Kostanovitch seems to have no trouble deciding what he wants Blaine to do first. Just like that - with one vow from his victim - Kostanovitch believes that he's won, and now that he has all the time in the world to extract his revenge. It's this kind of short-sighted thinking that allowed Blaine to ruin Kostanovitch's operations in the first place, but Blaine certainly isn't going to bring that to the aging Russian's attention.

"First, I want you tell this young man why this is happening to him," Kostanovitch demands; his eyes practically _twinkle_ , he's enjoying himself so much. "Tell _Sam_ how his _friend_ has lied to him and endangered him in this way."

Blaine's stomach flips. It's pretty much the worst thing Kostanovitch could have asked from him, and that's saying a lot. Blaine's been shot at, nearly blown up, dropped off of buildings, and almost strangled since being dragged into the spy life. That revealing himself to his best friend and the object of his affections feels _worse_ than all that is pretty messed up. 

"Bro, what's he talking about?" Sam asks when silence drags out behind Kostanovitch's command.

"Sam, I-" Blaine tries to turn to face Sam - one last time - but he can't manage it the way he and Sam are bound. So instead, he fixes his eyes on the back choir room wall, imagining he's just baring his soul before another difficult and revealing performance in front of the glee club. He doesn't want to see triumph in Kostanovitch's eyes for having caused Blaine this discomfort, however petty, or to picture the look of hurt and betrayal that might be spreading across Sam's face. He just says what he has to say and hopes that his voice doesn't break before he's finished saying it. "You know how Coo- how my brother's never home and we only ever really hear from each other through e-mail?"

"Uh..." Sam hesitates, obviously wondering what Blaine's brother has to do with _anything_. And then he says, "Yeah?"

"Well... he's not really an actor. And one of those e-mails... It wasn't just an e-mail."

Blaine gives Sam a condensed account of what happened to turn him from an average, ordinary (incredibly talented, gay Midwestern) high school student into an unofficial sleeper agent for an ex-CIA installation who occasionally does spy stuff that his brother fusses at him about and praises him for in equal measure. 

Blaine also tries not to give away any classified information that Kostanovitch may be hoping to overhear, but mostly he just keeps apologizing for having to keep Sam in the dark, and for allowing Sam to be Blaine's friend even though he was aware of the risks that come with that, and Blaine tries to help Sam understand that _everything_ that Sam knows about Blaine isn't a lie. Only what Blaine says he does when he's not with Sam or working on something school-related. And what he's said he plans to do for a living after high school, and where he's said he plans to go to college... And the fact that he's handled a gun and even shot at a person, and almost been killed many times, and never said a single, solitary thing about any of it-

Blaine finishes his story with not a whole lot of hope for anything but a cold shoulder and an accusation - and a lot of regret, which makes Sam's prolonged silence once Blaine stops speaking all the more painful.

But then, just as Kostanovitch opens his mouth to move Blaine's torment along, Sam says, with real heat in his voice, " _Bullshit_."

Blaine can't help but visibly flinch, and the outright _glee_ on Kostanovitch's face as he closes his mouth again and lets Sam have his say makes Blaine feel sick.

"Wha-"

"You're _sorry_ you _let_ me get 'mixed up with' you?" Sam repeats, sounding angrier with every one of Blaine's words that he repeats. "Blaine, I'm... honored to be your best friend, dude. I mean- Seriously! You're a _government agent_?! How awesome is that! If you want to apologize for anything, apologize for not telling me sooner that I've got, like, the _coolest_ best friend that any guy's ever had!"

Blaine can hardly believe his ears. 

He speaks in a daze, unable to contain a short, shocked laugh at the discovery that somehow Sam _doesn't_ hate him despite their impending deaths and every other reason for Sam to hate him besides.

"Well... technically, I'm not an _agent_ ," Blaine says. "Only, like, five people know about me because it's not really legal to store government secrets in a high school student's head-"

"But still!" Sam laughs too. "That's even better! You're, like, top secret or something. Classified! Oh, man, no _wonder_ you started kicking my ass at _Call of Duty_! Puck said there's something _unnatural_ about the way you shoot."

Blaine laughs again. He can't help it - there are even tears in his eyes, and not because he's afraid of dying here in the choir room, although dying - especially now - would suck. He's just so incredibly relieved and surprised and happy... He'd thought, at best, that perhaps Sam would forgive him for all of his deceptions, but Blaine had never allowed himself to dream that Sam would be _excited_ to learn about the truth. Happy to hear that his best friend leads a secret double life... And now it seems silly to Blaine that he hadn't. This is _Sam_ , after all. Blaine's soul mate on an entirely different level than Blaine still considers Kurt to be. Of _course_ , Sam considers this news something to geek out about and revel in.

Kostanovitch looks so suddenly confused and thwarted at the height of his vengeance that Blaine might have felt sorry for him if not for the whole 'I've-come-to-kill-you' plan that Kostanovitch has put into action.

"Okay, okay... If you " _kids_ " are done chit-chatting about why I'm going to kill you-"

"Aw naw, hold up, Boris, you said you wanted us to talk, so we're _talking_ ," Sam says, surprising everyone. (And making Blaine laugh once more at the unexpected Iron Man reference.) And then, softer, for only Blaine's ears, he says, "You know, I would have made an _awesome_ spy sidekick, dude."

There are still tears in Blaine's eyes and he blinks them away. "Yeah, Sam... You have," he says, leaning his head back against Sam's broad shoulders in the only gesture of affection that Blaine can manage with the both of them tied up as they are. He wishes he could tell Sam, even here in front of Kostanovitch and his men, how it was thinking of Sam... of how Sam was there for him through some of his lowest moments, reminding Blaine that he _is_ a good person, whatever he may have to do or pretend to do for the job... that's gotten Blaine through more than one crisis in the past.  
"Sam," Blaine says, hoping he has time to at least say this much before Kostanovitch gets tired of watching his plan to torture Blaine with words fail spectacularly, and moves on to more physical methods. "I l-"

"Hey! Was that a Titanium Man allusion I just heard?" comes an unfamiliar voice from above Blaine's and Sam's head. 

Kostanovitch startles and his men start barking things in Russian, but it's already too late for all that - and Blaine knows it, because the next voice he hears coming from some unseen location is not unfamiliar to him at all.

"I told you you'd like them," Blaine's brother tells whoever he's with the second before all hell breaks loose.

"Roll left," Blaine hisses under his breath as quickly as he can.

"What? Bl-"

"Now!"

Everything happens incredibly fast. Two bodies drop out of the ceiling as if from nowhere, at about the same time that Kostanovitch raises his sidearm again and his men start to go batshit crazy, not knowing where to shoot or - probably more correctly - who to shoot _first_.

Blaine kicks out with both bound legs at once, getting Kostanovich in the knees and making him an easy target for the first of Blaine and Sam's black-clothed saviors. Then he and Sam are rolling, awkwardly, out of the line of fire, as Kostanovitch's minions converge on Cooper and his companion in the middle of the choir room.

Bullets fly, luckily coming nowhere close enough to Blaine and Sam to wound either of them. 

Fists fly, too, and booted feet, and eventually it occurs to one of the Russians (not Kostanovitch, who is nursing both a busted kneecap and a broken nose, it seems - thanks to first Blaine and then Cooper) that maybe he should be attacking the only targets in the room unable to defend themselves. 

Blaine is crouching on his knees at the moment, still bound to Sam, so Sam is half-lying and half-sitting face-up and defenseless against Blaine's back. Blaine sees the goon get up from where he's been knocked off his feet and look for his pistol which has skidded across the room and near Blaine and Sam.

Then Blaine sees the goon see him and the look of intent that comes into the man's eyes.

"Shit!"

"Blaine, what?" 

Blaine struggles to think of what he can do to defend them and how he can explain to Sam what he needs Sam to do to make that possible. "Uh... remember that thing Coach Sue wanted me to do with Kitty for-"

"With the blowtorch and the sparklers? Dude, we don't have any of those, although that would be _really_ great right now..."

"No! Not with the- The _thing_ , where I tuck and roll and she-"

"Oh! Oh, yeah, yeah, I remember."

Blaine talks faster and faster as the goon heads their way, slowed only by occasionally having to dodge the flying body of one of his buddies or the defensive manuevers of Cooper and his friend. 

"Can you do that?" he asks Sam.

"Can I- _No_ , Blaine, I can't do-

"Well, you have to try!" Blaine yells. "Soon as I say go..."

"Blaine!"

The goon sees Blaine getting more solidly on his feet and lunges for his gun.

"Go! Sam-" Blaine pushes off the floor with his bound feet with all of his strength, hoping that Sam can manage what he's been asked to do, otherwise they're about to make total _asses_ of themselves and _then_ get themselves shot.

By all means that is exactly what should probably happen when Blaine tries to do a back-flip with Sam attached to his back. Sam is taller and bigger than him, and Sam didn't have to practice leaning in and out of this manuever to lend his weight to his partner as Blaine had to with Kitty for their NHSCC routine. 

But there's something to be said about fear and adrenaline and good, old-fashioned dumb luck. Also, the Intersect isn't just for giving Blaine migraines and improving his _Mario Duck Hunt_. The manuever _works_. Sam tucks and rolls as Blaine does his half of the move, and they manage to propel themselves up and _over_ the goon just as he reaches his gun, and as soon as Sam's feet are back on the ground, Blaine kicks up again and kicks their would-be shooter square in the jaw.

The guy goes out like a light.

"Blaine!"

Then Sam is whirling them around, and Blaine luckily guesses why as a second goon with a pistol in hand comes into view, nearing and aiming for them at the same time. Blaine's already kicked out, but this time not towards their attacker - towards one of the choir room chair sitting nearby. He hooks it with his feet and flings it just right so that it crashes into the side of the guy's face just as he's about to fire and knocks his gun (not to mention what looks like one of his teeth) out of the picture.

" _Я убью Вас_!" Kostanovitch screams, " _Я убью Вас всех_..." as he finally hobbles back into an upright position and retrieves his gun.

And Blaine is _ridiculously_ proud that, in a room with two trained CIA operatives and one soon-to-be member of their spy team, _Sam_ is the guy who knocks Kostanovitch out cold.

He head butts him, dragging Blaine along for the ride.

In the immediate silence afterwards, Blaine and Sam lay on their sides in a heap and try to breathe.

"Okay down there, baby brother?" Cooper asks, appearing over Blaine and grinning in a way that belies his worried eyes. They sweep over Blaine looking for injuries, becoming tight and narrow at the corners when they reach the blood on Blaine's shirt and the cut on his head. 

Blaine huffs, not knowing himself whether he's laughing or panting or just aghast at his brother's timing (and incredibly thankful.)

The man standing at Cooper's side is taller than Blaine's brother but built like him, lean with obvious muscles underneath his tight black t-shirt. He has closely trimmed dark hair that looks like it would curl if he grew it any longer and warm brown eyes. He doesn't grin or smirk at Blaine, he smiles, wide and happy, and this is obviously the spy that Cooper's been working with - the _other_ Intersect, the main one, the legend - but somehow Blaine gets the feeling that his smiles are like Blaine's gentle voice and charming nature. Exactly what they appear to be. The only people who believe that this man's friendliness and compassion are fronts for something darker and colder are the people who don't really know him, regardless of how well he kicked some Russian ass just now alongside Blaine's brother. 

"Hi, Blaine!" the man says. "I'm Chuck."

"Welcome to William McKinley High School," Sam says, facing away from all of them, sounding like he may have knocked his head into Kostanovitch's a little bit too hard. Blaine frowns in concern.

"Looks like fun," Cooper is saying, looking around at all of the unconscious Russians.

"You ought to see it during Diva week," Blaine says. And then: "Do you think you could untie me now, Coop?"

Chuck blinks and says, "Who?"

Apparently Blaine isn't the only one who his brother has kept on a need-to-know basis since (reluctantly) letting Blaine ease his way into the spy life.

Cooper pulls out a knife and avoids Chuck's eyes until Blaine and Sam are both free and the choir room is devoid of incapacitated terrorists.

It's almost dawn by the time they're all walking into the Anderson household, although none of them are interested in sleeping. Mom and Dad are still out of town (again), but Cooper still walks softly and looks around him like he's afraid that someone he doesn't want to talk to is going to come walking around the corner at any second. (Or maybe like he's afraid the house is bugged, which he shouldn't be. After Blaine learned about counterintelligence, he started doing routine sweeps of the whole property. This house and its surrounding yard are all clean.) 

Sam says he's going to go into the kitchen and get some ice for the lump on his forehead, and when he goes Chuck goes with him, making it very obvious that they're leaving the brothers to catch up alone for a while.

"So... _Bryce_ , is it?" Blaine can't help but start in right away.

Cooper just smiles in that way that Blaine found patronizing and irritating at one time, but is just thankful for right now. It's good that Cooper can be overly calm about all this, because Blaine is feeling anything but. 

"I was going to tell you about that when you got to California," he says, the fact that he means _if_ \- not _when_ \- clear to Blaine, but Blaine doesn't make a big deal about it.

In fact, Blaine feels the anger draining right out of him. He knows _why_ Cooper's been putting off telling Blaine more about his spy life while insisting that Blaine tell him everything about his own. He knows why Cooper's never introduced Chuck to Blaine in person or probably even told Chuck about Blaine before this trip. 

"You still think I'm going to back out?" Blaine asks. He could, he supposes. There are ways of suppressing the Intersect, Cooper's told him. But the Intersect is what brought Cooper back into Blaine's life, and spying is dangerous and difficult and not always pleasant, but Blaine is _good_ at it. He's done some real good since he started, even in the limited capacity he serves out here in Ohio. He loves the purpose behind what he does, the value of it, and - yes, although he can't say this to Cooper - the _thrill_ of the spy life. Blaine doesn't think he will ever give it up.

"I guess there's not much hope of that now, huh?" Cooper asks. And he's still smiling, but this is another time when his eyes just don't match his mouth. Blaine sighs, because there was a time when he wanted _so_ badly for Cooper to _feel_ what he'd put Blaine and their parents through by disappearing the way he did after college. Blaine wanted for Cooper to feel sorry, but there's guilt in Cooper's eyes now - real regret - guilt so deep it looks like it _physically_ hurts Coop, and Blaine wants to take it away any way that he can.

He knows better than to try. Nothing that Cooper's ever done was done because somebody told Cooper to it, whatever his old bosses at the CIA might have believed.

"Well, Chuck seems like a nice guy," Blaine says, changing the subject. 

Cooper laughs... almost shyly. It fascinates Blaine to watch. "Yeah. You two are going to get along great. I'm honestly a little frightened of how much."

There's something about Cooper's voice - something that was in the way he and Chuck moved together in the choir room, the way they leaned towards one another as they spoke in the SUV on the way here to Blaine's house afterward. Blaine recognizes it. He's not necessarily surprised to see it between Cooper and another man... But he is surprised to see Cooper not doing anything to hide it or avoid it or even disguise it as he talks about Chuck right now. Forget his reputation and his secret spy base out on the west coast - this is what tells Blaine that Chuck must be something really special. Cooper's never worn his heart on his sleeve - didn't even before he was a spy.

"Didn't you say that he got married the last time you two split up?" Blaine has to ask. If Cooper can be the dewy-eyed, lovesick one between them for once, then Blaine can be the overprotective paranoid one for a minute. 

"It didn't work out," Cooper says simply, making it sound not so simple at all.

Then he raises his hands, as if to say 'Not me' when Blaine keeps looking at him. "But I didn't have anything to do with that. I promise."

"Right." 

"I'll tell you all about it when you come to Los Angeles."

"You're going to Los Angeles?" 

Sometimes Blaine really wishes that the Intersect could give him super-senses to go with his new reflexes, rather than the head-splitting montage of imagery that he gets bombarded with whenever he sees an object or face or name that's in his database. 

He doesn't hear Sam enter the living room, but he looks up after Sam's spoken and there Sam stands in the doorway.

Cooper silently excuses himself, to go off and find Chuck, Blaine assumes, mostly because if he keeps thinking about his brother then Blaine doesn't have to think about how tonight might have changed things between him and Sam.

"Uh... yeah. After- After graduation. I'm going to go work for Chuck with Cooper."

Sam is so quiet. He's been quiet ever since they left the choir room. Part of that might be because of his near concussion, but at least part of it - Blaine is sure - is because Sam is silently freaking out about _almost being murdered by Russians_. Brought to his school by his best friend. Who - oh, yeah - happens to be a secret sort of-spy with a computer in his head and a former CIA assassin for a brother.

"So, what, all that stuff about going to NYADA and New York, that was all just a lie too?"

Sam's made his excitement over Blaine's career choice clear, but Blaine knew even as he felt relieved that Sam doesn't hate him for lying about the spy stuff that it isn't all as simple as that. Blaine's lied about more than just his being a spy, and Sam's bound to have some feelings about that.

"I did want to go to NYADA and live in New York," Blaine says truthfully. "Before. I'm going to go to school in California instead. Sam, it's not that I didn't want to tell you or-"

"You know I got into UCLA, right?" Sam interrupts Blaine, walking further into the room as he does. Blaine has no idea what Sam's thinking - there are no clues on his handsome face - but Blaine's heart starts to pound despite himself. 

"I know, Sam. I-"

"Didn't want me to know you were going to California in case I chose UCLA so then you'd be stuck with me?" Sam asks.

Blaine remembers the moment Kostanavitch held his gun to Sam's head and how numb Blaine had gone in an instant. He remembers thinking that he ought to have done more to protect Sam. If he were to start now, he could tell Sam what Sam is hinting that he expects to hear.

But Blaine can't make himself do it. "Sam, you _know_ that isn't it."

"Then what? You didn't want me in the way?"

"You were hardly in the way today," Blaine says. 

"Whatever. There are only two reasons I can think of for you tricking me into thinking you were going to go off to New York in the fall," Sam says, talking right over Blaine when Blaine tries to protest that he didn't _trick_ Sam into anything. "One, wherever you're going, you don't want me there. Or two, you think you're trying to protect me."

Sam doesn't sound like he likes either option.

But-

"We're just friends, Sam." That's all they were before Brittany broke up with Sam. And Sam got all weird when Blaine started questioning his choice to keep spying and tried to win Kurt back by proposing _marriage_. Before Sam suggested that they go to prom _together_ with an oddly hopeful look on his face for a guy asking another guy to go with him somewhere as a bro. "Why would I think you'd choose NYU just because you thought I'd be going to New York too?"

Sam is sort of right. Blaine didn't tell Sam when he decided, once and for all, to give up on NYADA and that he'd gotten into both Stanford and UCLA, all with the thought in mind that if Sam _did_ choose California just so he could be with Blaine, then it would be Blaine's fault if something happened to him there.

But that's not to say that Blaine actually believed Sam would base his decision simply on what Blaine planned to do. It was more wishful thinking than anything that had Blaine even considering Sam's wanting to go to college in the same city as his high school best friend.

Or so Blaine had thought.

"We're _best_ friends!" Sam says, sounding adamant. "And I- Dude, when I asked you to prom, I was-"

Blaine's heart is practically beating itself silly now.

"You what?"

Sam just keeps moving closer and closer. Soon Blaine's going to have to tip his head back to look up into Sam's sad, angry (nervous?) face.

Sam's nervousness wins out. "I want to know which it is, Blaine. Do you not want me around after graduation? Or did you have some... stupid idea in mind that you were gonna go off alone to fight, whoever, the forces of _evil_ or something all by yourself?"

Blaine thinks, possible, that they're getting off-topic here, but he can't _not_ object to this incredible disregard for Blaine's very noble attempt to sort of kind of protect the man he loves. 

"Excuse me?"

"Did you hear yourself back in the choir room, bro? You asked that guy to _kill_ you!" Sam is suddenly almost shouting, so completely upset about this that he must have been waiting to shout about this one thing in particular from the very beginning. "Dude, that was- That was fucking _insane_."

"I wanted to keep you _safe_ , Sam," Blaine almost shouts back. And he _does_ have to look up to look at Sam now - to glare at him, really - but he won't apologize for wanting to put Sam first, even if he hadn't managed to do it before the guys with guns showed up.

"More than you wanted to _live_?" Sam demands.

"Yes!"

The answer bursts out of Blaine before he can stop it. There's nothing else he could have said anyhow... just this truth. It makes Sam's eyes go wide and Blaine's throat go dry. It's a clearer confession than those three words Blaine had been about to say in the choir room would have been.

Blaine couldn't stop it and now he can't deny it, so he just owns up to it as best as he can.

"Yes, Sam... I- I love you. Not just 'like a brother'. Or like a bro... I _love_ you. I wanted to keep you safe more than anything, I-" Blaine swallows. "I never don't want you around."

It's absolutely quiet in the room. In the house. Cooper is probably right outside the door, listening in with some sort of device, because Blaine can't even hear him moving around in the other room-

"Thank _god_..." Sam breathes, almost startling Blaine.

"What?"

"Did you really think I wanted to take you to prom just cause I couldn't think of anybody else to ask?" Sam says. "Dude, I've been wanting to tell you that I don't love you like a brother either for, like, _ever_. And I didn't ask you out just for the 'boy kisses' either!"

Was a room full of international criminals exciting? Blaine's pulse is racing more now than it had then, and not just because he's no longer woozy now from the head wound Cooper cleaned up for him. 

"There were going to be kisses?" Blaine asks, everything else forgotten for the moment.

Sam's smile blooms slow but full. He looks shy but certain as he moves that last inch closer to Blaine and brings their faces within inches of one another.

"There still can be," he says, leaning forward to brush Blaine's lips with his. 

Meanwhile, Cooper (or _Bryce_ , depending on who you ask) sits in his father's study with the listening device he pieced together using a cordless phone and a laptop and spliced into the sound system in the living room.

Chuck is casually snooping through the cabinets and shelves on the other side of the room. 

"Spy sidekick..." Bryce mumbles and shakes his head, although there's already a smile tugging up the corners of his lips so he's obviously more happy for his baby brother than unsettled that the kid that took down the head of a Russian crime family with his _face_ is downstairs macking on Blaine like it's still their prom night and not the day after.

"What are you looking for anyways?" he asks Chuck, relatively sure that he already knows the answer.

"You can't tell me there isn't _one_ baby picture lying around here somewhere!"

"Nope," Bryce says easily. 

"Embarrassing prom picture." 

"No." 

"Awkward junior high yearbook photo?" 

"Not one." 

Chuck's smarter than that. Chuck is the smartest person Bryce knows. 

It would be a real problem if Bryce weren't equally ruthless. 

Chuck turns and smiles and asks, "I wonder what Blaine would say if I asked _him_?" 

Bryce starts to disassemble his makeshift surveillance gear and smiles back. "I'll tell Casey what you said about that time in Belize." 

Chuck immediately lets the cabinet he was rooting through fall shut. "Hey! That's not fair! I was under duress-" 

"I don't think Casey wants to hear what you were under when you told me about it," Bryce says confidently. ' _Namely_ me,' he thinks and smirks. 

Yeah, living and working side by side with Chuck _and_ Blaine is going to make it much harder for Bryce (or _Cooper_ , if you ask his brother) to maintain his reputation in the counter-intelligence world. But maybe he can make things a little easier for himself by getting on Sam's good side and now and evening his odds for when Blaine moves his new boyfriend out to the coast with him. 

Bryce will start by leaving guns out of it when he gives Sam his 'break his heart, I break your everything' speech. 

(Well, the big ones, anyway.) 


End file.
